Pocket closure



J. R. CONLAN POCKET CLOSURE May-26, 1959 S SheetS-Sheet l v File d Deo.'r, 1956 l V! TOR JOHN R. CONLAN imam/5y:

May 26, 1959 J. R. CONLAN POCKET CLOSURE s Sheets-Sheet 2 Filed Dec. '7,1956 urea/70k JOHN R- CONLAN May 26, 1959 Filed Dec. 7. 1956' J. CONLAN,2,887,689 POCKET CLOSURE 3 Sheets-Sheet 3 INVENTOI? JOHN R. ,CONLANUnited States Patent POCKET CLOSURE John R. Conlan, Vancouver, BritishColumbia, Canada Application December 7, 1956, Serial No. 626,996

2 Claims. (Cl. 2-252) This invention relates to a closure for pockets.

This invention may be used in association with any garment pocket, suchas shirt, pants and coat pockets, and with containers of the nature ofpurses, and it is to be understood that the term pocket as used hereinand in the appended claims is intended to include purses and othersimilar containers. However, for the sake of convenience, reference willmainly be made to garment pockets.

An object of the present invention is the provision of a closure forpockets which may be quickly and easily opened and closed without anycatches, or moving parts such as are used with zippers.

Another object is the provision of a pocket closure which may be usedwithout altering the normal construction of the pocket.

A further object is the provision of a closure for garment pockets whichmay be quickly and easily removed from the garment and returned theretowhen desired.

A still further object is the provision of a pocket closure which may bequickly snapped open and closed merely by flexing action and which isnot liable to open accidentally, but if it does, it makes a clickingnoise which may draw ones attention to the fact that the pocket hasopened.

A pocket, including a purse, has an opening or entrance which is definedby opposed walls. These walls are usually secured together at the sidesof the opening. In the case of a shirt pocket, for example, the shirtitself may form one wall of the pocket, and a panel which has been sewnto the shirt material forms the opposite wall. These two walls normallylie fairly close together, but there is nothing to prevent the contentsof the pocket from dropping out. The present invention includes, incombination with the pocket walls, a strip of stilt material extendingalong either wall of the pocket at the opening thereof, at least a partof said strip being in the form of a resiliently flexible section. Theflexible section of the strip has an area therein which changes itsposition in relation to the adjacent area of the section when the stripis flexed at' the latter substantially across its general longitudinalplane to retain the strip in the position to which it is flexed. Whenthe strip is in one position, it retains the pocket walls together tokeep the pocket closed. The walls cannot separate unless the strip isflexed from said position across its longitudinal plane, and when thisis done, the pocket is opened.

Examples of this invention are illustrated in the ac companyingdrawings, in which,

Figure 1 illustrates a fragmentary portion of a garment, such as ashirt, showing a pocket with the closure in closed position,

Figure 2 is a view similar to Figure 1, showing the closure and pocketin open position,

Figure 3 is a view similar to Figure 1 illustrating the opposite side ofthe pocket and showing a closure strip.

Figure 4 is a perspective view of one form of closure strip,

. 2,887,689 Patented May 26, 1959 Figure 5 is an enlarged fragmentarylongitudinal section taken on the line 5-5 of Figure 4,

Figure 6 is an enlarged cross section taken on the line 6-6 of Figure 4,

Figure7 is an enlarged longitudinal section through a closure strip andpocket with the latter closed,

Figure 8 is a view similar to Figure 7 with the pocket open,

Figure 9 is a fragmentary section taken on the line 99 of Figure 7,

Figure 10 is a fragmentary section taken on the line 10-10 of Figure 8,

Figure 11 is a perspective view of an alternative form of closure stripin its normal position,

Figure 12 is a section taken on the line 12-12 of Figure 11,

Figure 13 is a view similar to Figure 12 showing the closure strip inits closed position,

Figure 14 is a section taken on the line 14-14 of Figure 13,

Figure 15 is a section taken on the line 15-15 of Figure 13,

Figure 16 is a perspective view of a pocket in the form of a purse whichis closed by the closure, and

Figure 17 is a view similar to Figure 16 showing the purse in the openposition.

Referring to the drawings, 10 is a pocket having opposed walls 11 and 12and an entrance or opening 13. In this example, the wall 11 consists ofthe garment on which the pocket is situated, while wall 12 has a panelsecured to said garment by stitching 15 around three sides thereof, theedge 16 of the panel being free to allow for opening 13. The pocket mayactually be of any desired construction, but it is illustrated herein inthe simplest possible manner for the sake of clarity.

Figures 4 to 6 illustrate one form of closure strip 20. This stripextends along either of the walls 11 or 12 at the opening 13. However,it is preferable, in this example, to position it on wall 11. It may beon the outer or inner surface of said wall, but it is preferable tolocate it on the inner surface, as shown in Figure 3-. Furthermore, thestrip may be retained in position in any convenient manner. One way ofdoing this is to provide spaced retainer pockets '22 and 23 on the innersurface of wall 11 and opening towards each other. These retainerpockets are beside the opening 13 of the main pocket, and are spacedapart sufliciently to receive the ends of strip 20. With thisarrangement, the strip may be quickly and easily inserted into andremoved from the retainer pockets, and it cannot be seen from theoutside of the garment.

The strip 20 may be formed of any suitable stiff and resilientlyflexible material, such as spring steel or plastic with the requiredcharacteristics. While it is preferable to make the strip of a singlepiece of material, it will be understood that the strip may be formedwith a section spaced from the ends thereof which is resilientlyflexible, since the flexibility is usually required only at one areathroughout the length of the strip.

With strip 20 of Figures 4 to 6, the centre section 26, the ends ofwhich are designated by broken lines 27 and 28, is the resilientlyflexible section with which this invention is mainly concerned. Thissection of the strip has an area therein which changes its position inrelation to the adjacent area of the section when the strip is flexed atsaid section substantially across its general longitudinal plane. Thisgeneral longitudinal plane is the one in which the strip would lie if itwas straight. However, the strip is normally curved from end to end, asclearly shown in Figure 4, and this is to be considered its normalposition. In this example, the area in the flexible section whichchanges its position is in the form of a depression 30 formed in thestrip. This depression protrudes from the surface 34 of the strip, asindicated at 35 in Figures 5 and 6. This depression is preferably spacedfrom the edges of the strip at 39 and 40, but it is to be understoodthat it may extend the full width of the strip, in which case, most ofthe section 26 would actually be shaped to protrude from the surface 34of the strip. The depression is usually formed by pressing out a portionof the material of the strip so that the material at said depression isthinner than the surrounding material.

When the strip 20 is flexed at the section 26 substantially across itsgeneral longitudinal plane, the depression 30 snaps through the strip toprotrude from the opposite surface 42 thereof, as shown in broken linesin Figures 5 and 6. This retains the strip in the new position which isbowed in the direction opposite to that in which it is bowed when in itsnormal position. In order to restore the strip to its normal position,it is only necessary to flex it at section 26 back across its generallongitudinal plane, at which time depression 30 will snap back throughthe strip to its original position, thereby retaining the strip in itsnormal position.

By referring to Figures 7 to 10, it will be seen how the above-describedaction of the strip 20 is used to close and open the opening 13 ofpocket 10. Figure 7 shows strip 20 in its normal position. At this time,the walls 11 and 12 are stretched so that they are pressed together andthe pocket opening 13 is closed. When the strip is flexed in theopposite direction, it assumes the position shown in Figures 8 and 10,at which time walls 11 and 12 are separated so that the pocket is open.In order to close the pocket, it is only necessary to flex the stripback to its normal position. 1

Figures 11 to 15 illustrate an alternative form of closure strip 48which may be substituted in the garment for strip 20. Strip 48 may beformed of a single piece of resiliently flexible material, or it mayinclude only a single section formed of said material and incorporatingthe necessary elements for the proper functioning of the closure.However, it is usually mostconvenient to make the entire strip in thesame manner. A

Strip 48 is curved in cross section as'indicated at 50. This meansthatthe'material at the centre of the strip normally protrudes from thegeneral plane of the strip, as indicated at52. In this case, the generalplane of the strip'is roughly the plane the strip would lie' in if itwere flat. When the strip'is flexed across this general plane in thedirection in which said material normally protrudes, as indicated inFigure 13, said protruding material moves across the'plane at the pointof flexing, as

indicated at 53. 'If strip 48'were in the retainer pockets 22 and 23 atthis time, pocket 'would be open. When strip 48 is released, theprotruding material at 53 snaps back to its normal position to restorethe strip to the normal position thereof, at which time the pocket wouldbe closed. v v

Figures 16 and 17 are included merely to show how this invention may beapplied to a pocket in the form of a container, such as a purse. A purse60 is formed of side panels or walls 61 and 62 which are securedtogether in any convenient manner around the edges thereof at the topsthereof to form an opening 65. Either of the above-described closurestrips may be incorporated in or secured to either of the walls 61 or 62beside the opening 65. Strip 20 is indicated by broken lines in Figure17 in wall 61. When the strip is in its normal position, the walls 61and 62 are held together, as shown in Figure 16, and when the strip isflexed to its opposite position, the walls are held open as shown inFigure 17. The purse is then closed by flexing the strip back to itsnormal position.

There may be further variations of this invention. However, the basicidea is that a closure strip normally retains the pocket closed, andthis strip is so constructed that when it is flexed at some pointthroughout its length, the pocket is opened. When this is accomplishedby means of a depression which shifts from one surface to the other ofthe strip, the latter remains in its new position until it is flexedback to the original position. If the strip or a section thereof iscurved in cross section, the strip may be flexed to an open position,but as soon as it is released it returns to its normal position to closethe pocket.

What I claim as my invention is:

1. A pocket closure comprising in combination with a pocket having anopening with opposed defining walls, a single strip of stiff materialextending along a wall at the pocket opening, at least a part of saidstrip being in the form of a resiliently flexible section, and asubstantially concave depression in the flexible section protruding fromone surface thereof, said depression turning inside out to protrude fromthe opposite surface of the section when the strip is flexed at thelatter substantially across its general longitudinal plane to retain thestrip in the position to which it is flexed, and said depressionagainturning inside out back to its first position when the strip issimilarly flexed in the opposite. di-

rection to retain the strip in its original position, said strip'when inone position retaining the pocketwalls together thereby keeping thepocket closed and when flexed from 'said' position across itslongitudinal plane separating'the walls to keep the pocket open.

2. A pocket closure as claimed in claim 1 in which the material of thestrip at the depression is thinner than the material adjacent to thelatter.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS1,149,242 Yager Aug. 10, 1915 FOREIGN PATENTS 331,795 France May 7, 1903

